Re: Consciption and Evil Re: They gave their lives....

[Robert Shaw]

John D. Giorgis wrote


> At 11:25 PM 5/30/01 +0100 Robert Shaw wrote:
> >Conscription in the face of threatened war is an acceptable evil.
>
> Evil?   But how can evil beget good?
>
It has been argued that it can, and will inevitably do so.

> To me, the term evil inherently implies an "absolute bad."   Since
> conscription is not absolutely bad, I don't think that it can properly be
> characterized as an "evil."

Some things are absolutely wrong, though we may not always
agree on what they are. They can certainly be called evil.

Other actions are only relatively wrong. In sufficiently
exceptional circumstances they can be justified. I'd call
those actions lesser evils.

Whatever the terminology conscription is something
that should not happen but which is sometimes
better than the alternatives.

--
Robert